If you haven't seen BET Uncut, it's worth staying up to check it out. The program airs music videos so raunchy, they're not suitable until far past prime time. It provides a space where performers can take the sexual exploitation of black women to a new level.

"We care about your sister. Why don't you care about us?"

That's what Moya Bailey, 20, wants to know.

She's a junior who is majoring in comparative women's studies and pre-med at Atlanta's Spelman College.

In this case, the question is directed to rapper Nelly, but it could be asked of most hip-hop artists, as well as Viacom, which owns BET. Plans to host Nelly on campus as part of an awareness campaign to get more African-Americans to register and donate bone marrow went awry after Bailey and other Spelman women saw his latest video, Tip Drill. It ends with the performer swiping a credit card through a black woman's derrière.

Why is it, many of the women at Spelman want to know, that we can respond to Nelly's sister's need for bone marrow and yet he doesn't seem to care that his video insults and degrades black women?

The use of women as hypersexualized props for the fantasies of male rappers is endemic in music videos. Though the objectification and abuse of women aren't confined to that art form, it sets a low standard of behavior. R&B singer R. Kelly has been indicted on 14 counts of child pornography. He allegedly had sex with a minor and videotaped it. Rapper Snoop Dogg recently branched out to direct porn films. Nelly is marketing an energy drink called "Pimp Juice."

Once Nelly's handlers got wind of a protest being planned at Spelman to coincide with the bone-marrow drive, they canceled his appearance. Yet the controversy clearly struck a chord. A local protest is now part of a broad campaign to pressure Viacom to cancel BET Uncut. Viacom has said it has no intention of removing the show.

The general silence, indifference and complicity of African-Americans when it comes to disrespecting black women remain as troubling as the individuals and corporations that produce this junk.

Sure, Nelly has a right to make any video he wants. And yes, you don't have to watch it. But what women can't escape is the way these images affect others.

"We love hip-hop. But does hip-hop love us?" is another organizing slogan coined by the women at Spelman. So far, the response to their question is silence.